The use of resources is growing while the supply of resources may be waning out. This has made the European Union and Sweden interested in making the move towards a more circular economy. Landfilling is connected with a use-and-discard, or linear, economy. The waste tax, or tax on landfilled waste, was introduced in Sweden in 2000 in order to deal with landfilling. In this paper we want to look at the effect of this tax on a circular economy indicator. Using data collected between 1998 and 2007 this paper aims to examine the effect that the waste tax has had on the share of people employed in the recycling industry. Our theory is that with increasing costs for landfilling, recycling becomes a relatively cheaperoption, raising the levels of recycling, which raises the labour demanded for recycling companies, increasing employment. This theory is tested through the use of OLS regressions. The results support the theory that an increase in the tax on waste increases the share of people employed in the recycling industry.